Recently it has come to my attention that some Star Wars “fans” have fallen into a rut of unequivocal pessimism towards the Star Wars material of the past.
I’m not sure if it is sensitivity on my end or if it really is that blatant.
What I am eluding to is the talk many people seem to have when they’re referring to the George Lucas era of our beloved franchise.
It seems that people write off George Lucas as some mad scientist and Star Wars being an experiment gone wrong.
My ultimate beef with all this is the prequels…
I absolutely fully enjoyed Episodes I-III.
When I think of why people dislike these films it makes me wonder…
Episode I was rather dry for sure.
The story was, to put it lightly, a bit boring in the beginning.
But when you first lay eyes on Darth Maul, all of that changes.
To be honest, the story was still a tad boring but intrigue picked up.
Since the viewer knows what is to come of this hooded figure Darth Sidious, isn’t it fantastic to see how the story plays out?
I think people tend to ignore the joy they felt for the prequels and disregard the “connecting the dots” scenes they enjoyed and joined the bandwagon of naysayers.
When this movement of “hate” on the prequels first began, (I don’t specifically remember exactly when) it was a small distinguished group.
By distinguished I mean people who savor their own opinions and think of them as written-in-stone fact.
At some point after Episode III, a year or two after the prequel dislike was solidified, the movement became entrenched in Star Wars opinion.
It was almost as if these movies were so painfully bad that they were not even considered canon.
These sentiments sadly remain today.
Have you ever seen a post from the official Star Wars Twitter page referring to something awesome in the prequels?
Then you think about your experience of first seeing that awesome thing, whatever it might be and how much you enjoyed witnessing Anakin or Obi-Wan throwing peril aside to save the Galaxy?
Well I have.
After reminiscing, I often find myself drifting to the comments section where I see too many self-righteous fans spewing their hate and pessimism towards George Lucas and the prequels.
These same fans completely ignore the value and the sheer awesomeness the prequels gave us and throw them out the window like they are as useless as expired milk.
Now what the prequels did bring us was an expansive never-before-seen-look at the Star Wars universe.
Before Episodes I-III, we had no idea what the Galaxy looked like before the Empire, heck we didn’t even know there was a before the Empire!
The prequels gave us long sought after answers like bridging the many gaps between how Darth Vader became who he was in Episode IV, to what the Jedi Order was before their practical extinction and finally to the rise to power of the vaunted Emperor.
These are all so important to the nature of Star Wars that to knock them for simply being part of the prequels is asinine.
Sadly, it has become a new fad to hate on anything before A New Hope…
I’ve heard people say the problem with the prequels is that everything is too perfect.
When Anakin and Obi-Wan are falling to their imminent doom, at the last second Anakin reaches out to catch a thread while taking hold of his Master, saving them both.
I will say that if you are someone to has trouble separating fact from fiction than yes, you might struggle in enjoying these films.
But what gets me is the ones who seem to have the most to gripe about with the prequels are self-proclaimed “dedicated” fans!
I had someone on Twitter tell me a couple weeks ago that one of the problems with the prequels is the lack of material on Queen Amidala and Qui-Gon Jinn’s personalities.
This person was trying to tell me that these characters were very poorly written…
What’s more is this person is a high-profile individual in the Sci-Fi department!
How could you possibly fail to see the regal and stoic qualities of the Queen and the rebelliousness and personable traits of QGJ?
This is what I’m talking about.
So many people bash the prequels because it just seems like the thing to do.
The saddest part of this experience though was that if this one individual came to me with those comments, just imagine the thousands more who keep it to themselves?
Painful.
I for one am a staunch supporter of Episodes I, II and III.
Mr. George Lucas, you have me in your corner and I will always defend your work on your behalf.
-Sith Pacify out
sithpacify 